The theme of this game was Skyrim, mafia being members of the thieves guild.

Mafia

bsh1 (originally Flex) - You are Karliah, exiled from your guild by Mercer Frey after being accused of murdering a fellow member. For twenty-five long years, you developed a poison that you could use against Mercer Frey when he came back, knowing he would want to kill you. However, you missed your target, and instead hit someone else, paralyzing them temporarily. However, not only did you block them from moving, but the poison slowed their blood flow enough that they did not die from their wounds. This makes you the 2xRoleblocker. Each night you may choose another player. That player will be unable to use their role. You win with the mafia.

Tree - You are Brynjolf. When first met, you are looking for a way to teach someone a lesson, and are looking for someone to help. Once you find that person, you tell him the job, start a diversion, and let your new assistant do the work. Once your little mission is over, you know you've found a new member for your guild. Because you're always out looking for new recruits, you are the odd-night Watcher. Each odd night you may select another player. You will learn who visited them, but not what action(s) were performed. You win with the mafia.

Safe fake claim: Babette

Town

Voice - You are Faida, an innkeeper in the town of Dragon Bridge. Since you serve little purpose in the story, and are basically a side character, you are a Vanilla. You have no special abilities. You win with the town.

Rouke - You are Lucan Valerius, a shop owner who serves little purpose to the story, only offering one side quest. Because of your barely useful role in the story, you are a Vanilla. You have no special abilities. You win with the town.

Tejretics - You are Wylandriah. Your focus is solely on research, and despite being a powerful mage, you have to request help when you need to find something of importance. Due to your small involvement, you are a Vanilla. You have no special abilities. You win with the town.

Matt - You are Shadowmere. an "immortal" horse that spawned from a black lake. Your devotion to your rider makes you a helpful fighter during a battle, since arrows, spells, swords, even fire and bites from a dragon, have no effect on you. This ability to enter battle and leave unhurt makes you an Ascetic. You cannot be targeted by non-lethal actions. You win with the town.

Think - You are Cicero, fellow member of the Dark Brotherhood. You are strongly devoted to the Night Mother, as well as the Listener. You follow her instructions so strongly that you refuse to follow Astrid and leave. Even after leaving, you continue to follow the Night Mother. This makes you the Follower. Each night you may select another player. You will learn what action(s) they took, but not on whom. You win with the town.

Disc (originally Breaking) - You are the DragonBorn. Everyone knows who you are. You are famous among the Nords, and popular among the Holds (whether that popularity is positive or not is another story). Due to this popularity, plus your toughness that helps you win fights, you are the Popular. You take one more vote to lynch than normal. You win with the town.

Valosa - "You have committed crimes against Skyrim and her people. What say you in your defense?" - You are a Solitude Guard, known for keeping order in the capital kingdom. Your ability to keep outlaws in check and identify thieves makes you the Cop. Each night you may select another player. You will learn if that player wins with the Town (innocent) or not (guilty). You win with the town.

Special thanks to DD, Valosa, and bsh1 for replacing in during the series.

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This was my first time coming up with all of the roles, making sure they were balanced, and then getting characters for them. It was an interesting experience, and I got balance help from Sapphique and F-16.

I was thinking about changing the roleblocker to 3xshots, and F-16 pointed it out too, but it didn't seem like a huge deal since town wasn't overly powered in action roles (cop and follower), so I left it as a 2xshot. I figured this would be fair enough as the games usually only have 3 NPs.

I also realized as I was looking back at my PMs that I originally had the follower set to 2xshot as well, but I apparently skipped that when finalizing the list. TB only got to use it twice anyway, but at the expense of a NK, so I apologize for that.

Another killer for mafia was inactivity. They missed their actions NP2, and that definitely hurt them.

<<----------->>Note to the players:

Disc, you're doing well. You've gotten much better at the game, but in this game, as well as others, you've often put your vote on people based on meta-analysis. That is fine depending on what their meta is, especially if there's an obvious and consistent difference. You, however, voted Matt at one point because he voted earlier in the DP than usual.

Flex (though this is more of a message to any scum ringer who have a noob buddy), You need to be much more descriptive and much more helpful in your explanation. When your buddy asks you, "They're asking me for a claim. What should I do?", your response should not be "make a fake claim" 24 hours after they asked it. You need to explain to them what they're doing, how to do it, and why. It may take time, but that's what you signed up for.

Fun fact: Voice was already the NK target, and I had the night actions for NP1 on a sticky in the corner of my screen. I shared my screen while in a hangout with him to show him a picture, and he saw the night actions on the sticky, as well as the scum team. Lucky for me, he was already going to die. Unlucky for me, this meant he could no longer replace anyone.

This game's balance was way off. Town had three power roles (unlimited follower, unlimited cop, and a popular). The follower and the cop gave town too much investigative power which mafia had too little to counter, and the popular was a confirmable role that would be extremely hard to mislynch. Populars are rarely mafia, so the role conf. effectively translated to affiliation conf. Meaning that town began the game with a townie who would invariably be confirmed town, and a cop who could confirm other townies, and a follower who could confirm the existence of the cop and could have found out the mafia's roles simply by seeing what actions were performed.

And to balance this out, mafia had what? A 2x roleblocker? That was absurd. The roleblocker should have been unlimited. The presence of the ascetic--essentially a confirmable role--did not justify limiting the town to a 2x roleblocker because it was mathematically unlikely that anyone would target the ascetic (and esp. unlikely that both roles would target the ascetic on the same night, meaning that town had a virtually guaranteed investigative power, unless the mafia, by sheer luck, roleblocked the investigative role which did not target the ascetic.) And, targeting the ascetic wouldn't have been totally useless for town, because it would've contributed evidence towards role confirmation. And if the follower had found out that a roleblocker existed, the ascetic would've essentially been confirmed town, because no way would mafia have a roleblocker and an ascetic on their team. Moreover, the presence of the ascetic undermined some of the utility of the roleblocker to begin with. If Valo targeted Matt, and I roleblocked Valo, my shot was basically wasted.

And why was Tree given the lookout? That role was totally useless--he might as well have been a goon! There was no way he could've claimed watcher and gotten away with it in a game with 2 town investigative roles, and with the ascetic, his role's utility was limited still further. Plus, with so few town visiting roles, it may have been hard for him to pinpoint which townies had the active roles.

I feel very much like I was dealt a losing hand. I needed that extra shot so that I could roleblock Valo and kill Disc. I could not risk Valo surviving to Cop me in that final DP. I could've persuaded Valo to vote Matt in that scenario.

Regardless, Vaar is a new mod and so I shouldn't be to hard on him for mistakes like that, which I made plenty of myself when I started out modding. He ran the DPs well, and that's laudable. But, I think the lesson going forward is to do more to assess how the roles interact and to make sure mafia is not unduly handicapped.

At 10/16/2016 10:01:58 PM, bsh1 wrote:I feel very much like I was dealt a losing hand. I needed that extra shot so that I could roleblock Valo and kill Disc. I could not risk Valo surviving to Cop me in that final DP. I could've persuaded Valo to vote Matt in that scenario.

I would have killed the popular anyway. You already had the cop convinced that a redirector probably existed so them potentially copping you was not that big a deal given how widely townread you were by everyone but me. The bigger threat in LyLo was the popular, which limited possible mislynches to only one rather than the two potential mislynches present in most three person LyLo situations.

All this is not to imply that I disagree with you about your balance assesment by the way.

At 10/16/2016 10:01:58 PM, bsh1 wrote:I feel very much like I was dealt a losing hand. I needed that extra shot so that I could roleblock Valo and kill Disc. I could not risk Valo surviving to Cop me in that final DP. I could've persuaded Valo to vote Matt in that scenario.

I would have killed the popular anyway. You already had the cop convinced that a redirector probably existed so them potentially copping you was not that big a deal given how widely townread you were by everyone but me. The bigger threat in LyLo was the popular, which limited possible mislynches to only one rather than the two potential mislynches present in most three person LyLo situations.

I disagree. No matter what, there was only ever going to be one lynch option. If I NK'd you, Valo was obvious town, and so Matt still would've been the lynch target.

Moreover, as soon as we got down to three players, the possibility of a redirector existing was zero (since Matt could not be both the redirector and the ascetic). This means if Valo had cop'd me, I would have clearly been scum. I had urged Valo in the second to last DP not to cop Matt because I was hoping for a Matt lynch, and that meant that I was very concerned about Valo targeting me.